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In this article, the history of the South African Navy (SAN) and its<br />predecessors is reviewed, as well as the interaction with other Commonwealth<br />navies during the years 1910 to 2010. Although the Union Defence Forces were<br />established in 1912, the Union only acquired its first naval force in 1922, when the<br />South African Naval Service (SANS) was formed. In the meantime, the country’s<br />naval defence was conducted by the Royal Navy (RN). During World War I, 164<br />members of the South African Division of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve<br />served in the RN. The SANS’s three small ships were withdrawn from service in<br />1933 to 1934, and when World War II broke out, the country’s naval forces had to<br />be built up from scratch – but soon played an important role in patrolling the Cape<br />sea route (and also saw action in the Mediterranean). After the war, South Africa’s<br />naval forces were rationalised, but – in the context of the Cold War and the Soviet<br />threat to the Cape sea route – the SAN then gradually grew in size and importance,<br />albeit that it was (and today still is) small in comparison to major Commonwealth<br />navies. In 1957, the SAN acquired the RN’s Simon’s Town Naval Base. Many<br />exercises were held with the RN and other navies, but gradually South Africa<br />became more isolated internationally because of the National Party government’s<br />racially-based policy of apartheid. In due course, this impacted negatively on the SAN and its interaction with other navies. In 1975, the Simon’s Town Agreement<br />was abrogated and in 1977, the United Nations imposed a mandatory arms embargo<br />against South Africa. In the meantime, the Republic of South Africa (RSA) became<br />embroiled in the Namibian War of Independence (1966–1989) – a war that spilled<br />over into Angola. The SAN played a small, albeit important, role in the war, but the<br />conflict affected the navy negatively. The advent of the truly democratic RSA in<br />1994 opened new opportunities for the SAN, and since then, the SAN has<br />undertaken many flag-showing cruises to several Commonwealth and other<br />countries, while many foreign warships, including from Commonwealth navies,<br />have visited the RSA and exercised with the SAN. |
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